here and there

Saturday, March 12, 2016

Vietnamese Spring Rolls

This is a recipe that I have been doing since we lived in another city and used to eat these delicious Vietnamese Spring rolls in a restaurant. The wrappers were filled with fresh vegetables, pork and shrimp and then deep fried!My whole family loved these spring rolls which we all dissected to see what was in the wrappers. The stuffing was not minced so easily identified and easily made at home. I have been making these for my daughter in university as a quick supper. They are her favourite and I still continue to have a supply in my freezer. There is no real recipe other than using a package of ground meat, chicken or pork, thinly sliced Chinese cabbage or regular cabbage, grated 2 -3 carrots, diced small onion, grated ginger, handful of chopped cilantro. Mix well. The filling is a very mixture and you can add more to create a very colourful filling. Sauté the meat and finely chopped onion.. Thinly sliced pea pods, green onions are nice.. However, bean sprouts are a pain as they poke through your wrapper!! Chopped shrimp can also be added to the filling. I don't put garlic into the filling as I can't stand the smell in the deep freeze as they are first frozen on a cookie sheet before packing them in a covered container.

The spring roll wrappers that I find are the easiest to use and do not tear are made in Singapore by Spring Home, TYJ Spring Roll Pastry. These can be found in the Asian section of your super market.

About 2 tablespoons of the filling were added to the centre of the wrapping.

The wrapper was folded up and then each side was folded inward to make an envelope. A trick I learned was to dab a bit of a flour and water mixture at the top end to help the wrapper stick together.

The package of 50 wrappers, even though I made a big bowl of filling, 5 wrappers were left over. Not a problem, wrap half a banana and enjoy it with maple syrup or ice cream!!

Since I had Tourtiere filling leftover. I used this along with caramelized onion, hot mango sauce, slivers of pineapple , cabbage and cilantro.

This filling was very tasty and as always tasters are a favourite of my hubby and I! The spring rolls can be deep fried but I have been baking them in my toaster oven for years. Lightly spray the uncooked spring rolls with cooking oil and bake until golden and crispy, about 20 minutes! Serve with a sweet and sour sauce, my husband loves Hoisin sauce.